There are no snowflakes in hell
by dhalpin3
Summary: I've been mulling over writing a story about Illyana 2.0's creation, but found the story daunting. As I wrote Magik Meltdown and revisited Illyana more traumatic experiences I glimpsed the outline of a story. A rather painfully and horrific story but one that really helped explain her early behaviors quite well.


**There Are No Snowflakes In Hell**

Authors Note: At the end of the Phoenix Five storyline we find Illyana explaining to her Brother that there are no snowflakes in hell. A rather chilling statement that I think speaks volumes about what happened to her (and as usual her brother was not listening to what she was really saying). He so wanted her to be snowflake that he had turned a blind eye to her actions and much more importantly denied what she was and what she had done. This did nothing to help Illyana's sense of self worth as she knew that he was being willfully blind; it likely just reinforced the believe that she was not worthy of his love and that he did not love her; just an image of her.

I've been mulling over writing a story about Illyana 2.0's creation, but found the story daunting. As I wrote Magik Meltdown and revisited Illyana more traumatic experiences I glimpsed the outline of a story. A rather painfully and horrific story but one that really helped explain her early behaviors quite well.

What happened that traumatized Illyana 2.0 so badly that she regressed so far into her demonic Darkchilde persona? When I first wrote this story I had forgotten that Illyana learned that her brother actually lived just before she killed herself (re-read the Inferno ending again last night). Then it hit me. Illyana 2.0 is not only about trauma, bad decisions and soul quest. It's also about untreated and miss-diagnosed mental illness and likely brain trauma.

Illyana 1.0 kills herself, Illyana 2.0 is literally born in hell. Yes the demon nature is there, but where her friends/family and teammates take as self-centered, demonic evil behavior is in part the actions of a broken mind. Her impermeable mind shield only compounded the problem as Emma and Scott focused on assimilation with her old teammates instead of realizing the true depths of the damage.

Illyana's journey is not only one of soul, but one of mind as well. To know what you once were, and believe you cannot be again, is a torture of heartbreaking depths.

So I updated this story with that take in mind, and I'm updated my prior stories as well.

**Part 1: Death **

Her brother was the last straw. Of course he had not recognized her. She couldn't recognize herself anymore. She couldn't face him again. The shame, the self loathing, the depth in which she had fallen. Then she found a solution. End it, end it all.

Illyana exerted her powers to the fullest. The teleportation portal expanded to a massive size encompassing most of New York City. She poured all that she was, all that she wished not to be into the enchantment.

The eldritch power flared over the entire earth sweeping the marauding demons back into limbo. Then she hurled her soul sword into the heart of darkness itself. The sword carried her final enchantment, the ending of herself. Erasing her presence from limbo and all that she had been. Illyana had one last whisper of a thought as she killed herself, a final regret.

_"I wish I could have seen Piotr one last time to say goodbye". _

And then she was gone.

Only the armored husk of a body remained, which turned out hold the child Illyana, the Illyana that might have been if Illyana had also escaped limbo with the X-men so long ago.

The Illyana that later died of the legacy virus.

This is not the story of the Illyana who killed herself or the young Illyana who died.

This is the story of the Illyana that came to be.

**Part 2: Birth**

Illyana, the thought of her haunted Belasco. She truly lived! He has seen her in his scrying mirror. Yet she was now concealed, hidden away from him. They were depriving him of what once was his, should be his, would again be his!

With an all consuming rage and passion Belasco has again pitied his strength against the current ruler of limbo. She had defeated him before, but that was back when he had some small sliver of hope that the current ruler of limbo might in fact somehow be his Illyana. Now he knew her to be false, a pretender to the name of Magik. He was awash in indignation and rage and power.

The battle for the control of limbo was but a stepping stone to him, part and parcel to regaining what was rightfully his. Amanda, the false Magik, had fallen to earth yesterday, caste out of limbo by limbo's rightful lord. She was of no concern anymore, considered but a trivial practitioner. She was an impediment and she had been removed.

Belasco had used all of his sorcerer's skill and power to find Illyana, but she was still somehow concealed from his sight. In a besotted rage Belasco rashly decided on a course of action that would have profound implications upon the multiverse.

In the heart of his power, the throne room of limbo, he painted his pentagram. He crafted an irrespirable summing spell. A magical emptiness in the shape of Illyana was created. Then he used his master spell and all the power of limbo to create a magical vacuum as it were to fill that shape, to pull Illyana from wherever she had been concealed.

All that he had was put into the spell. To retrieve someone who did not exist. Someone who died a long time ago.

The few tomes of arcadia that spoke of such summoning all warned of the dangers. The item to be summoned must exist. The tomes did not speak of the consequences that might happen if the item did not as each situation was unique. Belasco misinterpreted the word must, he took it to mean the item had to be in existence. The tomes were trying to warn that the item would exist regardless of its current state.

The spell summoned Illyana. But she was not.

Limbo fractured, and so partially did Belasco's mind.

Illyana was not, but the out-of-control spell found something in the fracturing of limbo. The fabric of limbo itself remembered Illyana, its former ruler. The Darkchilde. The very essence of limbo was squeezed into the Illyana void and made flesh. The thoughts and dreams and memories of the Illyana that had been, right up to the moment she killed herself, were embodied in this new flesh, the flesh that took on the form she had wore at the time of her death.

Only one detail was missing, her soul. For this was not a reincarnated Illyana. This was a new Illyana, one that remembered all that a former Illyana knew. But built from limbo, cloaked in demonic flesh.

The smoke cleared, the limbo quakes ceased. Belasco picked himself off the floor to find not his beloved blond blue eyed Illyana but instead a demonic incarnation of Darkchilde, tail and all.

**Part 3: Broken**

She was confused, disorientated, in pain. She could not recall who she was or her name. All she could recollect was that she had been killing herself to save _?them?_. All she had was but an echo of a thought, a hope, a prayer. A wish that she might see someone one last time.

_"Piotr"? _She whispered a name, daring to hope, hope for what she did not yet know. Call it a hope for heaven, for redemption, for salvation. Could there actually be a heaven for one such as her?

The reply was pain.

A vicious back handed blow flung her across the floor. She screamed at the sensation, at the pain, at the rejection. As she lay stunned on the floor a foot savagely kicked her in the stomach and again flung her again across the floor only to rebound off a pillar. A hand grasped her throat and pulled her to her hooves.

_**"YOU ARE NOT HER, NOT HER!"**_a voice screamed. She was unable to make out the face as her vision was blurry (eyes yet to learn how to properly focus) and from the sudden assault.

_**"BIND HER PILLAR"**_ the voice uttered and unseen hands grasped her and held her tight against the stone pillar while the hand started to choke her.

She was so confused. Where was this? What was this? Who was this? Why was this happening?

_"Piotr it's me it's..."? _Her voice trailed off, as she did not yet recall her name. All she could do was beg in a croaking whisper as the hand squeezed, _"Please stop, please it's me"._

Again the screaming,_ "__**YOU ARE NOT HER, NOT HER!"**_. Hot spittle striking her, red eyes discernable through the blurriness. Then her throat was released allowing her to draw a ragged breath.

The reprieve was brief, the situation only to get worse, much worse. The beating went on and on and on.

Blows to the face, noise broken and teeth knocked out, eyes swollen, hair torn out

Blows to the body, broken ribs, internal bleeding

Blows to the arms, broken wrist, broken fingers some twisted almost off

Blows to the legs, a broken knee, crushed hoof

Bite marks, an ear gnawed upon, a finger bitten off

Tail partially cut off

Slashes all over from his knife, some deep, some shallow, all ragged

And worse...

All the while she was screaming and begging for it to stop. Screamed for help, for rescue.

Crying out for her friends.

Screaming for her brother.

Nobody came, she was not rescued.

Finally the physical beating ended and an evil voice whispered in her ear _"You are not her, you are not my Illyana. You are less then the filth upon the ground"._ The whisper was scarier then the prior screaming. It implied that the speaker had regained partial control of himself.

_"You thought me her brother, how droll. No little snowflake. You are all that he hated, all that everybody hated. Everything I hate. This is what you deserve. This is your reward, my Darkchilde. Welcome to hell". _

Then he used his magic's to rape her mind while he raped her body.

In the end her mind was as broken as her body.

She was conscious through it all.

**Part 4: Discarded**

She lay upon the throne room floor, a crumpled toy.

She no longer screamed. She no longer begged.

The wicked voice spoke one last time. _"S'ym take this garbage from my sight and fling it from the walls for the carrion feeders to consume, assuming they can stand the taste of her". _

She felt her hooves and lower legs grabbed as her naked body was cruelly dragged from the room. All she could do was give soft shrieks of agony as her voice box was badly damaged.

In the end she felt herself hosted into the air and flung into space. She fell and bounced down a raged and sharp rocky incline. Yet more damage done, her demon body was tough, but not that tough.

Additional concussions

More broken bones

Shattered eye socket

Broken back

Left leg savagely dislocated and twisted beneath her body

She came to rest upon a flat shelf of rock, a slow growing pool of blood beneath her.

She had but one thought.

_"Let me die, please just let me die". _

Consciousness did not fade away, death did not come.

Only some rat like carrion feeders that began to gnaw upon her other leg. She closed her one remaining eye in despair and tried to will her own death.

She had been alive but two hours.

Then a thought surfaced within her mind. "_But then the FATHER will just do it all over again"_.

No, not THAT, not THAT again and again and AgainAndAGAINANDAAAAAAA.

Her one eye snapped open with a red glare. Her right hand lashed out and seized one of the carrion eaters who only had time for startled squeak before she crushed it; the other vermin scattered in all directions.

With screams bubbling in her throat she used the broken carcass as a paintbrush to draw a crude circle around herself with her own blood. Once she was done she began to search for her magic.

She remembered how the power had felt back when she had _?lived?_ before. The concept of before was confusing, linked to the pain. Part and parcel to what HE had done to her. To remember was to relive THAT. She mentally retreated to the now and the need of the now was healing.

She found her magic, expressed her will and desire for healing. However, healing mental injuries needs guidance, direction, a sense of what is correct. In short identify, and her's had been savaged.

Flames covered her body, feeding upon the blood. She writhed in renewed agonies. The flames burned away the hurts. Her limbs unbent, broken bones rejoined. Missing parts regrew.

But her mind was still in tatters, her identify but a faint recollection cloaked and bonded to horror.

**Part 4: Damned**

In the end she stood whole of body but not of mind. She looked upon her hands for the first time and felt her face and the horns upon her head. She tried to remember who she was. Tried to remember a thought of a name.

_?Illyana?_

She convulsed in remembered agony. No, not her, **SHE WAS NOT HER, NOT HER**. The FATHER had made that very clear. Driven it into her mind and what little sense of identity she retained.

Unwanted

Unloved

Hated

That's what she was. That's all she deserved.

She was Darkchilde and she was in hell because she deserved it.


End file.
